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WHO maternal death and near-miss classifications

Article  in  Bulletin of the World Health Organisation · October 2009

DOI: 10.2471/BLT.09.071001 · Source: PubMed

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Editorials
WHO maternal death and near-miss classifications
Robert Pattinson,a Lale Say,b João Paulo Souza,b Nynke van den Broek c & Cleone Rooney d on behalf of the WHO
Working Group on Maternal Mortality and Morbidity Classifications
Reducing maternal mortality is the
Millennium Development Goal 5. To
reach this goal, countries need an accu-
rate picture of the causes and levels of
maternal deaths. Recent systematic re-
views have shown that there are many
inconsistencies in the way maternal
deaths are classified and there is a lack
of standard definitions and criteria for
identifying severe maternal morbidity
and near-miss cases.1,2
WHO established a techni-
cal working group of obstetricians,
midwives, epidemiologists and public
health professionals from developing
and developed countries to develop a
maternal death classification system.
The group established three prin-
ciples for its work. First, the classifica-
tion must be practical and understood
by its users (clinicians, epidemiologists
and programme managers), Second,
underlying causes must be exclusive of
all other conditions; as in the Inter-
national Statistical Classification of
Diseases and Related Health Problems
(ICD), the underlying cause is the
disease or injury which initiated the
sequence of events leading directly to
death, or the circumstances of the ac-
cident or violence which produced the
fatal injury. Third, the new classifica-
tion system should be compatible with
and contribute to the 11th revision of
the ICD. Incorporating this maternal
death classification into the ICD will
encourage consistent use in both death
certificates and confidential enquiries
into maternal deaths, and improve the
comparability of data.
The proposed maternal death clas-
sification system was sent to more than
40 individual reviewers and the Inter-
national Federation of Gynecology and
Obstetrics, the United Nations Chil-
dren’s Fund (UNICEF), the United
Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)
a
MRC Maternal and Infant Health Care Strategies Research Unit, University of Pretoria, Gauteng, South Africa.
b
Department of Reproductive Health and Research, World Health Organization, 20 avenue Appia, 1211 Geneva 27, Switzerland.
c
Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, Liverpool, England.
d
Office for National Statistics, London, England.
Correspondence to João Paulo Souza (e-mail: souzaj@who.int).
734
and national professional organiza-
tions including the Royal College of
Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, the
American College of Obstetricians
and Gynecologists and the Canadian
College of Obstetricians and Gynae-
cologists. Revised after this feedback,
the second version was tested on eight
databases of maternal deaths: national
databases from Colombia, Jamaica and
South Africa, other databases from
Kenya, Malawi and Zimbabwe and
verbal autopsy data from Afghanistan
and Nigeria. All sites found the clas-
sification workable and useful.
The new WHO classification of
cause of maternal death has a sim-
ple structure to facilitate tabulation:
group, disease category and individual
underlying causes. The group includes
three categories: direct maternal
deaths, indirect maternal deaths and
“unanticipated complications of
management”. This addition makes it
possible to track trends in iatrogenic
disease as, for example, related to
caesarean sections. Underlying causes
are clearly separated from conditions
contributing to fatal outcomes. Finally,
the working group decided to clas-
sify suicide in pregnancy, deaths from
puerperal psychosis and postpartum
depression in the category of direct
maternal deaths.3
The working group also reached
consensus on how to define maternal
near miss – “a woman who nearly
died but survived a complication that
occurred during pregnancy, childbirth
or within 42 days of termination of
pregnancy”.4 Signs of organ dysfunc-
tion that follow life-threatening condi-
tions are used to identify maternal near
misses so that the same classification
of underlying causes is used for both
maternal deaths and near misses. This
consistency and a set of near-miss
Bull World Health Organ 2009;87:734 | doi:10.2471/BLT.09.071001
indicators enables assessments of the
quality of care provided to pregnant
women.
The WHO technical working
group recommends that the new
maternal death classification system
be adopted by all countries and the
maternal near-miss approach be con-
sidered in national plans for improving
maternal health. By using the same
classifications, reliable comparisons can
be made within and between countries
and regions. Applying this classifica-
tion should help to identify the health
system shortfalls that countries need to
address in order to reduce complica-
tions and fatal outcomes of pregnancy
and childbirth. ■
Acknowledgements
Available at: http://www.who.int/bul-
letin/volumes/87/10/09-071001/en/
index.html
References
1. Khan KS, Wojdyla D, Say L, Gulmezoglu
AM, Van Look PFA. WHO analysis of causes
of maternal deaths: a systematic review.
Lancet 2006;367:1066-74. PMID:16581405
doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(06)68397-9
2. Say L, Pattinson RC, Gülmezoglu AM. WHO
systematic review of maternal morbidity and
mortality: the prevalence of severe acute
maternal morbidity (near miss). Reprod Health
2004;1:3. PMID:15357863 doi:10.1186/1742-
4755-1-3
3. Report on the World Health Organization
Working Group on the Classification of Maternal
Deaths and Severe Maternal Morbidities.
Geneva: World Health Organization; 2009.
4. Say L, Souza JP, Pattinson RC. Maternal near
miss – towards a standard tool for monitoring
quality of maternal health care. Best Pract
Res Clin Obstet Gynaecol 2009;23:287-
96. PMID:19303368 doi:10.1016/j.
bpobgyn.2009.01.007
 Editorials

Acknowledgements
The following individuals were among
the members of the expert group that
developed the identification crite-
ria for maternal near miss: Affette
McCaw-Binns, Anoma Jayathilaka,
Buyanjargal Yadamsuren, Cleone
Rooney, João Paulo Souza, José
Guilherme Cecatti, Lale Say, Linda
Bartlett, Mary Ellen Stanton, Mohamed
Cherine Ramadan, Nynke van den
Broek, Robert C Pattinson, Rogelio
Gonzalez,Veronique Filippi. We thank
Ahmet Metin Gülmezoglu, Jelka
Zupan, and Vicky Camacho for their
contribution. This work was funded by
USAID and UNDP/UNFPA/WHO/
World Bank Special Programme of
Research, Development and Research
Training in Human Reproduction
(HRP).

Bull World Health Organ 2009;87:734 | doi:10.2471/BLT.09.071001 A

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